Letters to the editor, March 11

Muncie citizens, stop the takeover. In one fell swoop, HB 1315 silences the voice of taxpayers and voters by taking away your elected school board. Authors worked behind legislative scenes excluding Rep. Errington and Sen. Lanane from any prior information regarding this onerous legislation.

If this becomes law, it punishes your teachers by stripping their ability to collectively stand up for students and teachers; perhaps better put by MTA President Pat Kennedy as she reminded the Senate Appropriations committee, “When you are a teacher advocate, you are a student advocate.”

Muncie is my hometown. I graduated from Muncie Community Schools. Both my sister and I graduated from BSU and had long careers as public school teachers, public school advocates, and members of our respective teacher unions.

Simply put, Muncie was built by labor and labor unions. Don’t silence the teacher collective voice of their union. Don’t put an end to the voice of those on the front lines every day with your kids – standing up for them. They are striving to make your schools good and your children successful.

Are you willing to sit back and let the state of Indiana grease the way for BSU to take away your voice, disempower your teachers, and rob you of your votes? Tell legislators – all of them – to just say NO!

We seem to have a habit in Indiana and Muncie of allowing school administrators to walk away scot-free, as we say, from all the damage they did to the schools, with the highest praise and awards possible to give.

Ward’s excellent coverage of our school mess has been as fair as it’s going to get, in my view. We know the names of the two culprits who were let off scot-free and with the highest praise for creating this mess in the MSC.

We also know the name of the BSU president whose watch was responsible (she even hand-picked the culprit) for the stealing of about $11 million of BSU’s money.

She was allowed to retire with the highest honors from the trustee chairman, the board, the mayor, the governor and the Republican General Assembly. She walked away from the biggest scandal in BSU’s history scot-free. And so did the culprit.

As one who loves BSU, I don’t take pride in saying what I have on my mind in this letter. If it bothers you, it should. The Fort Wayne pol who called Muncie a “cesspool” missed her target; it is the General Assembly and Daniels and Mike Pence.

B.J. Paschal

Muncie

Trump is not a racist

Donald Trump is neither a white supremacist nor a racist. He has strongly and repeatedly denounced all forms of racism and bigotry, but that’s not good enough for anti-Trump partisans who are bent on keeping him in the box they’ve put him in. Aside from a few off-hand remarks conveniently misconstrued for partisan advantage, Trump has given no evidence of being a racist.

If Trump is a racist, why does he have the continued support of Christian evangelist Alveda King? Why did Alveda King, niece of Martin Luther King Jr., vote for Donald Trump? I’ll tell you why. She knows Trump personally and has always liked and admired him. She says he’s very smart and that he absolutely is not a racist. Alveda herself is certainly not a racist, but she has been called one, believe it or not.

“I’m a conservative,” said Alveda last August during an appearance on the Jim Bakker show. She’s also a true Christian, promoting God’s agenda rather than Satan’s. She tells it like it is, which is why I like her so much. She’s not about to bear false witness against her neighbor, especially the man whom God has installed in the White House.

If there were more Alveda Kings in this world, it would be a much better place.